'Hair,' growing through the years

March 11, 2011|By Doug George | Tribune reporter

1967: "Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical" has its off-Broadway debut at the Public Theater, with book and lyrics by James Rado and the late Gerome Ragni and music by Galt MacDermot. Actors Rado and Ragni had worked on the musical about the '60s counterculture movement since 1964, basing the characters on themselves, the youth movement and draft dodgers they witnessed in New York's East Village.

1968: "Hair" opens on Broadway in the Biltmore Theater, produced by Chicagoan Michael Butler. It runs for 1,750 performances, producing Billboard chart hits along the way, including for "Good Morning Starshine" and "Aquarius." In addition to the songs, much has been made of the nude scene at the end of Act 1. For the current production, Broadway in Chicago advises parental discretion: "There is a dimly lit … scene with nudity that is nonsexual in nature."

1969: "Hair" makes its Chicago debut at the Shubert Theatre, including in the cast a very young Chicago actor named Joe Mantegna in the lead role of Berger. In the following decades, "Hair" is an on-and-off phenomenon — in the early 1970s seven road companies tour the United States.

1979: A movie version is released, with a screenplay by Michael Weller.

1996: A new stage version is produced by Butler at the Athenaeum Theatre in Chicago.

2009: Director Diane Paulus' Broadway revival opens at the Al Hirschfeld Theater, a Public Theater production that grew out of an outdoor, 40th-anniversary presentation in Central Park, New York. It wins the Tony Award for best musical revival and runs for 519 performances. It's staged the following year at the Gielgud Theatre in London's West End.

2011: Touring production of "Hair" runs through March 20 at the Oriental Theatre in Chicago.